Poor Man's Fight: The Odyssey of a World War II Bomber Crew

By Russell L. Greer

July 1944. USAAF Major Marvin Zander and the crew of their B-17 bomber, Poor Man's Fight, are savaged by German fighters over Friedrichshafen, Germany, and forced to land Dubendorf, Switzerland. Despite Switzerland's proclaimed neutrality, Zander and his men now find themselves in an amorphous and sometimes dangerous netherworld somewhere between peace and war, where friend cannot be readily distinguished from foe. At the outset, they are warned by Swiss authorities not to attempt an escape. Should they be caught while attempting such, their punishment will be harsh and quick. While interned, they will not be treated as prisoners of war but as internees. Even though their treatment is not harsh, Allied internees are subjected to privations of food and medical care, both of which take a toll on their collective health. Will that stark warning of draconian punishment by Swiss authorities be enough to deter the crew of Poor Man's Fight from orchestrating an escape attempt?

"Through the lenses of historian, bomber pilot, and storyteller, Russell L. Greer shines a light on a dark and little-known corner of World War II through captivating narrative and fascinating characters. A superbly entertaining read!"

--Maj. Gen. (Ret.) Steven J. Berryhill, USAF

• Language: English
• Publisher: Newman Springs Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Feb 1, 2022
• ISBN: 9781638815754

Book preview

Acknowledgments

My extreme gratitude goes out to Lieutenant Colonel (Ret.) David S. English, my stalwart and esteemed friend since those heady days of USAF Undergraduate Pilot Training and the B-52G/H Initial Qualification Course (Copilot) in the early 1980s, when we were young and ready to take on the world. Throughout the course of my research on this and other manuscripts, whenever I have posed a technical- or aviation-related question to which he does not have an immediate answer, he always seems to know where to look or who to ask, and his assistance has always been invaluable.

Four other special people also deserve my heartfelt thanks: Susan Lownds Bryant and her father, the late Colonel John Lownds, both of whom were my high school German teachers, and the late Dr. Miles McGinty, the first of my German professors at the University of Georgia in the fall of 1975. Thanks also to my friend Conny Steinfeld Bregar, who keeps my German grammar and vocabulary in check and always insists that my spoken German is better than I think it is.

Of course, I wish to express my gratitude to my wonderful wife, Karen, who graciously tolerates my long hours in the basement office while I endeavor to bring this and other yarns to life.

Russell L. Greer

Woodstock, Georgia

2021

One

Blind Squirrels

USAAF B-17G Flying Fortress Poor Man’s Fight

385th Bombardment Group (Heavy)

Vicinity Friedrichshafen, Germany

Altitude: 29,000 Feet

Assigned Target: Dornier Flugzeugwerke (Dornier Aircraft Works)

Friday, 28 July 1944

Linney got his when a piece of shrapnel big enough to jolt the entire airplane penetrated the skin of the radio compartment, tore off a chunk of his left buttock, and destroyed his radio operator’s stool. Seconds before it happened, he had returned to sit at his table after opening his retractable upper window and mounting his .50-caliber machine gun. The remainder of the shrapnel from the flak burst had clattered like hailstones hitting a tin roof along the left side of the airplane, both inside and out.

Christ Almighty! he shouted over the intercom. I’m hit, and the bastards wrecked my damned chair!

Hang on, Linney. Ralph’s on his way. Pilot to right waist, Major Marvin Zander, the pilot, said over the intercom in his unhurried, almost nonchalant voice, get up to the radio compartment and have a look at Linney.

Wilco, Skipper, Sergeant Ralph Jendze answered in a clipped tone. Clearin’ off intercom and goin’ forward now.

In addition to his duties at the right waist gun, Jendze was also the assistant flight engineer, and Zander had called on him to move about the airplane to tend wounded crewmen and for other reasons because he was whippet thin, very nimble, and better able to negotiate tight spaces like the narrow catwalk through the bomb bay. He was going to have to squeeze his slender form around the upper framework of the ball turret to make his way through the rear door of the radio compartment to reach Linney.

Jendze cleared off intercom, connected himself to the nearest yellow portable oxygen bottle, and got to Linney quickly.

How ya doin’, Melvin? he shouted over the noise of the engines before remembering to connect himself to the extra communication cord.

They shot my ass off! Linney shouted back in reply and winced with an embarrassed look on his face.

Does it hurt? Jendze asked.

Hell yeah, it hurts! How much ass do I got left, Ralph?

Jendze rolled him from his side onto his belly to have a look.

You still got about three-quarters of it from what I can see, he answered as he pulled out his survival knife and cut away enough of Linney’s leather flying trousers, heated flying suit, and skivvies to sprinkle sulfa powder from Linney’s first aid kit and place a battle dressing on the wound. Jendze knew he had to work quickly and get back to his waist-gun position because when the flak stopped, the enemy fighters would pounce. He calmed Linney down with a morphine syrette without bothering to tell the rest of the crew which of Linney’s ass cheeks was now missing in action. However, he could see it as a splatter of red and pink goo now freezing against the right inner aluminum skin of the radio compartment.

Jendze told Major Zander, Right waist to pilot, the cold seems to be staunchin’ the blood, freezin’ it. I think he’ll be okay for now, Skipper. Ain’t no way I know of to put a tourniquet on an ass anyhow.

The outside air temperature at this altitude was something on the order of −40° Fahrenheit and very close to that inside the unheated, unpressurized aircraft. An ass cheek’s worth of sheepskin-lined leather flying gear and the blue electrically heated felt bunny suit underneath was now missing, rendering the heated suit and the flying boots connected to it useless, but Linney was trying to fight through the morphine. Jendze was relieved to see that Linney had the wherewithal to immediately unplug his bunny suit to avoid being electrocuted by the suit’s compromised circuitry. He was unable to sit and was not inclined to lie down, mumbling through his warm opiate-induced haze and informing the crew that he was manning his one gun and would be working standing up for as long as possible.

Staff Sergeant Robert Plumb, known to the crew as Plumb Bob, the flight engineer and top turret gunner, wondered how long Linney would hold out with an inoperative bunny suit, missing tail feathers, and a snoot full of morphine. Although it might be his million-dollar wound that would send him home, Linney was on his twenty-third mission, as was he, and they needed to complete the requisite thirty for a trip Stateside and home to Mama. If Linney was hurt badly enough, he would be going home.

Jendze had returned to his gun and reported back up on intercom. Knowing that and the idea that Linney was going to at least try to stay in the fight, Plumb found himself a bit more at ease, but only a little.

Major Zander’s voice came over the intercom once more. Pilot to crew, I need a damage report on that flak burst.

After a short pause, during which all ten crew members looked around their respective stations for signs of damage, serious or otherwise, T-Bone reported first. Tail compartment’s good, Skipper. No other damage that I can see lookin’ over either shoulder.

Looking over his right shoulder at Sergeant Solomon Salty Eichenlaub and getting a thumbs-up, Jendze replied, Waist-gun positions are okay, Skipper. No damage to any wirin’ or control cables that we can see. Radio compartment has some sheet-metal damage, but the radio equipment looks okay. Other than Linney’s ass, it don’t seem like nothin’ to worry about.

Ball turret’s good, Skip. No damage or leaks on the bottom of the airplane that I can see. Turret’s still operational, said the diminutive Sergeant Dudley Pendleton, the smallest man on the crew, who was suspended below the aft belly of the bomber in his cramped Plexiglas- and aluminum-framed sphere. In the airplane, the breezy, affable Pendleton never referred to Zander as Skipper. It was always just Skip.

Top turret to pilot, Plumb Bob said next in crew order, no oil or fuel leaks from any of the engines that I can see from up here. That shell must’ve exploded out past the left wingtip and peppered the trailing edge of the left wing near the root and right below the radio compartment. There’re some small holes in sheet metal, just aft of my position, but no other damage that I can see. It don’t look like any wirin’ or control cables got hit. We might have a damaged flap on the port wing, but I got no way of tellin’ based on what little I can see. Top turret’s still operational, and we still have electrical power goin’ where it needs to go.

After checking all his engine instruments, generators, and fuel switch settings, the copilot, First Lieutenant Lee Wayman, simply gave Zander a thumbs-up, indicating that everything was good on the flight deck.

From the Plexiglas dome in the nose, the togglier, Staff Sergeant Andy Killer Killea, a former waist gunner who had been moved forward to the nose to man the bombing system and the chin turret’s two .50-caliber machine guns, looked at Stats, got the thumbs-up, and told Zander, Stats and I are good up front, Skipper. Bomb sight and system are both good even though I don’t really need ’em. I’ll salvo when the lead ship releases, like always.

Zander concluded glibly, Pilot to crew, it looks like we’re still contestants in this beauty pageant.

The threat of German fighters was somewhat diminished if the black-brown explosive puffs from the Fliegerabwehrkanonen, antiaircraft guns or flak, below were coming up to greet them. As it always did during prior missions, time seemed to almost stand still for Plumb Bob, and some of the others admitted to the same sensation. He was still completely functional and recalling everything, but it also gave him a sense of being a spectator, almost as if he were watching it through someone else’s eyes and hearing it all like he was underwater. It had a detached, surreal feel to it, like a condemned man on that last, agonizing walk to the electric chair.

From his vantage point in the top gun turret of Poor Man’s Fight, he had a panoramic view of the bomber stream and the battle unfolding around him. In some respects, it was the best seat in the house. He could rotate the turret 360° and observe anything fore, aft, and above the bomber. If the threat were far enough out to the front or the rear, he could see a bit of what was below as well. None of the other crew positions had such a commanding view.

On several previous missions, Plumb and the others had noticed a peculiar phenomenon emanating from the flak punctures in the aircraft’s aluminum skin. The frigid air entering those holes at nearly 150 miles per hour tended to whistle if the sheet metal was bent exactly right and turned the entire B-17 into a large flute. He was just going to have to deal with the shrill noise all the way back to England, so he simply turned his intercom volume louder to mitigate it.

Flak was the threat against which the bomber crews literally had no defense, aside from the armored bibs and steel helmets they wore on top of their leather flying gear. The pilots could only grit their teeth and steel themselves to maintain tight formation, fly through it, and hope for best, all the while expecting the very worst. As vicious as they were, the German fighters at least afforded the bombers some ability to fight back. Despite only being able to lumber along straight and level, the Boeing B-17G Flying Fortress was literally bristling with thirteen .50-caliber machine guns from her nose to her tail, and any gunner worth his salt would consider it to have been a wasted effort to land back in England with even a partial load of ammo.

Currently, the flak was being aimed by radar, owing to the solid undercast, yet Plumb Bob could plainly see that, because of the moisture content of the air at their altitude, they were flying at contrail altitude. When the exhausts from the engines hit the moisture in the air, each bomber was producing four contrails that served as the skeletal white fingers of the Grim Reaper, signaling to the gunners on the ground and the Luftwaffe fighter pilots exactly where they were. If the flak crews couldn’t see them through the clouds, the fighters above them certainly could. Those contrails were eerie advertisements that proclaimed, Here we are. Come get us.

The only upside to the contrails was that their fighter escort of P-51 Mustangs, which had yet to appear, might just be close enough to see them and ride to the rescue. If the bombers were producing contrails, the German fighters likely were too, and theirs would be inviting the Mustangs to the fight and producing ample warning to the gunners in the bomber force. Plumb had once heard it said that tracers worked both ways, and he knew that the same held true for contrails.

The flak and the solid undercast below were causing more than a little consternation with the navigator, Second Lieutenant Charlie Stats Spunt, an MIT math major and statistician, who was very concerned that the navigator in the strike force’s lead airplane was taking them off course, potentially ten miles south of the Initial Point, the IP, which was the last planned point the force would have to align itself with the target and bomb in favorable forecast winds. Across France and into southern Germany, there had been a solid white undercast with occasional buildups of puffy white cumulus clouds beneath a dazzling blue sky and brilliant sun—an otherwise gorgeous day to fly, save for the deadly business at hand. If only the undercast would break and he could pick up some ground references, he could cross-check them with his chart and see just how far off course they were. By his dead reckoning, the strike force would soon fly over the southern shore of Lake Constance, alarmingly south of where it should be.

One of Linney’s myriad duties as the radio operator was to back up the navigator by monitoring the radio-navigation fixes on the way to the target and back as well as sending out position reports to Pinetree, back in England. Today, Linney had groused plenty about the intermittent beam signals he had been receiving. He complained that the needles in his gauges were dancing more than usual, and the Germans were either intermittently jamming or electronically bending the beam, which certainly fell within the scope of their electronic countermeasure capabilities.

But Stats knew where they were, and another of his unspoken concerns was that the strike force was on the verge of entering Swiss airspace, which might well provoke hostile responses from Swiss antiaircraft guns and fighters, an occurrence that had been reported in the past by crews that had strayed over Switzerland. The officers had recently been briefed on it, and threats that heads would roll were issued to pilots, navigators, and bombardiers for any such repeat fuckups. The Swiss embassies in Washington and London were raising hell and hurling accusations and denials back and forth about the destruction of Swiss cities and civilian deaths.

Stats gave little credence to threats made by the Eighth Air Force brass against the pilots, navigators, and bombardiers. He had already figured the odds and decided that, based on group manpower concerns, inadvertently dumping the odd load on Switzerland was not going to amount to anything more than a bit of less-than-complimentary paperwork placed in someone’s personnel file, if that. Selectively chosen and expensively trained crew members were not going to be arrested, taken into custody, and slapped into a nice, safe stockade for the duration of the war because German rail hubs, troop concentrations, and factories could not be bombed from the confines of stockades. Besides, the mission briefers had suggested Switzerland as a possible divert destination, the only viable one, for a mission this deep into Germany.

What did concern him was the fact that the Swiss Air Force flew Messerschmitts, specifically the Me-109G series, the same as the Germans, and that was more than ample reason to fret. Given his proclivity to calculate odds of any situation, Stats also determined that the neutral Swiss would not want to get involved in the monumental dustup that was brewing on the edge of their airspace. Further, and with almost no thought whatsoever, he calculated that the odds of the strike force hitting the aircraft factory from its present location and heading ranged between zero and zero. So for the past fifteen minutes, he had been imploring Major Zander to allow him to break radio silence and inform the bomb group commander in the lead ship that they were going south of the IP.

Negative, Stats, Zander told him. We’re followin’ orders and maintainin’ radio silence. None of the other aircraft in the force have broken it, and I don’t intend for this crew to be the first. The colonel’ll figure it out and get us back over the IP.

Through his perspective of temporal distortion, Plumb realized that the flak had stopped and the fighters, twenty-four Me-109s that he had already spotted off in the distance, were flying a parallel course to starboard and some two to three thousand feet above the bombers’ altitude. Plumb had read this book before and knew they would race ahead of the bomber formation then make a descending left 180° turn into the bombers. They were going to meet the bomber box in a line-abreast formation that was as precise and impressive as any Luftwaffe flyover at a Hitler birthday parade. The German pilots, however, were not going to exit the bomber stream in that same pretty formation. The firepower of every gun and the determination of every gunner in the bomber stream would see to that.

Top turret to crew, he announced, we’ve got what looks like two squadrons of One-oh-nines at two o’clock high, movin’ past us to one o’clock. They’re gonna fly out ahead of us, turn into us, and hit us head-on. Get ready.

Swinging his turret around to the nine o’clock position, he noticed what appeared to be two additional squadrons of Focke-Wulf Fw-190s to the north, performing a series of Immelmann climbing turns to gain height and reach the bombers’ altitude, after which they would also race ahead of the strike force and launch head-on attacks of their own, tearing at the big Boeings like a school of sharks ripping flesh off a pod of whales.

Top turret to crew, there’re also two squadrons of Fw’s off at nine o’clock level. Everybody, keep your eyes peeled.

Plumb had read the intelligence reports that the Kraut flyboys were no longer too keen on attacking the bombers from astern even though it was their best chance of downing a B-17 or B-24. They were spooked by the much lower closure speeds, which gave them the opportunities to better aim and sustain their fire at the bombers’ wing fuel tanks and oil reservoirs, but these stern attacks from below exposed them directly to the four .50-caliber machine guns of the ball-turret and tail-gun positions. After getting in a couple of squirts at whichever bomber they were attacking, they would break away, frequently down and to the left. During that break, they would still be belly-up to the threat from the ball turret, from which the stalwart Pendleton would skin ’em alive, in his way of phrasing things.

As wary as the German pilots were about approaching too closely during the stern attacks, T-Bone and Pendleton were equally unnerved by them. Both expressed the same fear, though only to each other, that they were amazed that they had survived the first few missions, and T-Bone attested to the idea that some had come so close that he could clearly see the Germans’ eyes under their goggles and that he could almost reach out and shake hands with the bastards or punch ’em in the face.

The Germans’ best hope in a stern attack was to neutralize the ball-turret and tail-gun positions quickly, but that was sometimes tantamount to kissing a porcupine because Dudley Pendleton was not the least bit timid about opening fire. In the tail, Sergeant Theodore T-Bone Bone, the cynical, reticent Colorado ranch hand, had no reservations about hosing them down either.

These days, the Germans preferred head-on attacks in a ten-degree dive angle, which made for much higher closure speeds, thus making them exponentially more difficult for the gunners to track as well as providing the more inviting targets of the surface area of a B-17’s huge wingspan. It also presented them the opportunity to kill the crew members responsible for flying the airplane, navigating, and dropping the bombs. Those lightning-quick closure speeds meant they would blaze through the bomber formation in mere seconds, allowing them to use their energy to climb back up and come around again, ammunition and fuel reserves permitting, and Plumb was desperately hoping that they would be low on fuel today.

As soon as the first wave of fighters opened fire on the lead elements, the air was going to come alive and sizzle with tracers flying in all directions from both the fighters and the bombers. With the fighters’ tremendous closure speeds, any given gunner would be lucky to get a piece of one, much less knock a Kraut fighter out of the sky. But Plumb had always been fond of saying, "Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while."

The P-51 Mustangs had not yet arrived from England. The realization that the Mustangs were nowhere to be seen stripped Plumb of whatever positive feelings he had been having, and as always, just before Hell came to dinner, he felt the usual nausea and bile rising in his throat, which dissipated as quickly as it came on. He was now ready to get down to the brass tacks.

On the flight deck, Major Zander was fretting about the lack of P-51 escorts as well. Two squadrons of RAF Spitfires had ridden shotgun on the bombers through their ninety-minute, upwardly spiraling, often hair-raising, and dangerous process of climb-out-and-strike force assembly. The chances of getting jumped by German fighters over the English countryside were slim, although the Germans had tried it in the past, and it had been reassuring to see the Limeys and their Spitfires along for the ride.

The first relay of P-47 Thunderbolts made the rendezvous right on time as they went coast in over France. With their limited range and new ground-attack duties in France, after the Normandy invasion, they would peel away before returning to England, drop down on the deck, and strafe ground targets of opportunity as soon as the longer-range twin-engine P-38 Lightnings arrived for the second relay. The P-38s got them halfway across France then were forced to break escort and return home, wreaking their own share of ground-attack havoc on German ground forces along the way.

Although they had the longest range of any Allied fighter and were sorely needed on missions this deep into Germany, the Mustangs were nowhere to be seen. They may have gotten socked in back in England by that weather front moving slowly in from the Atlantic, or perhaps they had been jumped by Luftwaffe fighters somewhere over France, Zander speculated. Maybe they were simply lost. That had happened before, but the reasons were irrelevant because no recall message had been received from Pinetree, Eighth Air Force Headquarters, and the bombers were forced to press ahead to the target without them. They missed the rendezvous, and Zander was eager to get to the mission debriefing and hear what the bullshit excuse was this time.

With the myriad things running through his mind, he continued to fly formation and maintain his exact position in the bomber box as the 548th Bombardment Squadron’s lead airplane. Presently, he was leading his group’s high squadron and maintaining position on another bomber from the 549th named Curve Ball, using the picture he had established in his windows to keep his exact position. He smiled under his oxygen mask, recalling having once asked Banfield, the pilot of Curve Ball, why he had given his airplane that name.

Hard pitch to hit, Banfield had replied with a Cheshire cat grin. Since the Krauts don’t play baseball, maybe they won’t hit us at all! Knock wood!

It made perfect sense to Zander, who replied, "Charmed life! Let’s hope they don’t put the wood to ya!"

He had done enough close-formation flying that he was no longer cognizant of the continuous precision inputs he was making with the control yoke and throttles. His formation flying was aggressive but exceptionally smooth, to the delight of everyone else aboard the airplane. Maintaining tight formation in the bomber box was imperative to bring the maximum amount of firepower from each airplane on attacking fighters and provide mutual protection for the whole formation. Oddly, it gave him time to think through any number of various disastrous scenarios that might befall him and the crew of Poor Man’s Fight.

Are we in Germany too deep to make it back to England on anything less than four engines? Can we divert to airfields in Switzerland without getting ourselves killed? Can we get medical assistance for Linney? he asked himself.

The list of questions, possibilities, and probabilities seemed endless.

Pilot to top turret, he said, any sign of our ‘little friends’ yet?

Plumb responded, Negative visual, Skipper.

Pilot to tail gunner, you see anything back there?

Negative, Skipper. They ain’t at our six o’clock. I don’t see ’em anywhere.

Ball turret?

Negative, Skip.

Zander responded, Everybody, stay on your toes. Conserve your ammo. Lead your targets and fire short bursts. Keep the intercom racket to a minimum, but call ’em out by clock position when you see ’em.

After a silence of ten seconds, Plumb saw the Me-109 squadrons execute a descending turn to port and form line abreast for their first pass.

He alerted the others. Top turret to crew! Here they come, twelve o’clock high, spreadin’ out from eleven to one!

A plane flying in the skyDescription automatically generated with low confidence

Plumb Bob could not yet hear the fight over the roar of the four nine-cylinder Wright Cyclone radial engines, but he could see it as the first of the Me-109 squadrons opened fire on the lead bombers. He saw the nose and top turret of Arsenal of Democracy, the strike force commander’s airplane, erupt with red tracers as the fighters pounced. One blind squirrel quickly found a nut and put a burst into the canopy of one plucky German flyboy who instantly lost control of his airplane but missed the colonel’s bird and collided with the flight deck of Borrowed Time, flying behind and slightly below the colonel. Borrowed Time immediately nosed over into a 90° vertical dive, ablaze from wings to tail, and disappeared before Plumb could see any parachutes.

Almost immediately, Plumb felt the aircraft shudder and heard the jackhammer staccato of machine gun blasts from the nose compartment as Killea opened fire with the chin turret guns and Stats fired two quick bursts from the left cheek gun. Before he could react to it, he saw a mottled brown-violet, gray, and green Me-109 flash by with its cannon and machine guns winking with muzzle flashes. As he followed the fighter with his turret, he saw Soiled Dove in the low squadron at the seven o’clock position with its starboard wing ablaze. Its bomb doors were open, and Soiled Dove’s togglier was jettisoning the bombs as the aircraft began to fall back from the formation and lose altitude. When it was clear of the formation, crewmen began to tumble out through the bomb bay and the aft hatch before it, too, fell from his field of view. As quickly as it had begun, the attack by the first wave of fighters was over, and Plumb swung his turret back around to meet the next one.

The second German squadron hit them quickly. Up ahead in the lead bomber squadron, Plumb saw pieces of sheet metal fly off the port wing of Shady Character as fire brewed-up in its number one engine and it began to fall back from the formation. When it became a straggler, the fighters would go after it and tear it to pieces.

Seconds later, he witnessed a burning Me-109 zip directly under the nose of Poor Man’s Fight, with its engine ablaze and flames engulfing the cockpit. The pilot was frantically flailing his burning arms as he attempted to open his canopy and bail out. The poor bastard was burning alive.

As soon as the second wave was past, Killea reached back and tapped Stats on the shoulder, pointing out ahead of Poor Man’s Fight. Stats looked up from his chart to see that the undercast had broken and the formation was exactly where he thought it would be. They were over the southern shore of Lake Constance and in Swiss airspace.

Navigator to pilot, he said urgently, we’re over the south shore of the lake! This won’t work, Skipper!

By now, radio silence had been forgotten, and seemingly every bomber in the stream was calling for a course correction. Stats then felt the airplane go into a left bank as Zander played follow the leader, as was imperative in close-formation flying, and mimicked what the colonel and the others were doing.

What are we doin’, pilot? Stats asked.

Zander responded, Pilot to crew, looks like the colonel’s takin’ us on a three-sixty to get us back around to the IP.

Plumb Bob’s spine began tingling with an electric sensation, a feeling he got only when he was truly terrified. This was the scenario every bomber crewman dreaded. The feared three-sixty over the target area involved two 180° turns, interspersed with two long straight legs to realign the strike force with the predetermined IP to the target. He had been on one three-sixty before, and nearly every bomber that did not go down made it back to England with some sort of battle damage and wounded crewmen aboard and more than a few with one or more KIAs.

So, Plumb Bob thought, here was the bomber stream, buck naked to whatever the German radars could see and, of course, the fighters, about to fly through it all one more time. Both the flak and fighters would have another crack at them and probably more as the German ground controllers would likely vector other fighter squadrons to the turkey shoot.

We gonna have enough gas to get back home, Skipper? Plumb asked.

That ranges from ‘debatable’ to ‘probably not,’ Zander replied enigmatically.

Zander had no time to explain. Friedrichshafen was a mission profile better suited to the B-24 bomb wings because of their greater range. Yet for some strange reason, the B-17s had been fragged for this one. Owing to fuel considerations, there were no zigzag diversions built into the flight plan to keep the Germans from guessing their target, although a diversionary force was launched before them on its way toward northeastern Germany in hopes of drawing as much fighter- and radar surveillance attention as possible away from the main strike force. The diversionary force would not even go very far inland over Germany, however. Perhaps they would be hitting the submarine pens at Kiel again. The strike force was to fly basically a straight shot over the English Channel and across western France to Friedrichshafen and back. Fuel was precious on this run, and Zander was fully cognizant of the aviation adage, "The only time you have too much gas is when you’re on fire."

When the formation was established in the left turn, Plumb’s nightmare came roaring back to life. He had momentarily forgotten about the Focke-Wulfs, and now the colonel’s decision was turning the bombers right into them. But if this strike on the Dornier Aircraft Works was to be deemed any kind of success at all, the colonel was locked into his choice of making the three-sixty. The Focke-Wulfs simply made a hard ninety-degree right turn, which put them in a ragged semblance of line-abreast formation, and they dove headlong into the bombers.

The Fw-190s had powerful large BMW radial engines that presented a low profile for their pilots and also served as armor of sorts. The Focke-Wulfs were more lethal these days, given that some of the newer variants were packing four twenty-millimeter cannons in their wings, in addition to two machine guns mounted atop the engine and synchronized to fire through the propeller. Those four cannons were installed with the specific intent of knocking down heavy bombers, and from what Zander had seen, it did not take too many hits from those twenty-millimeter rounds to do the job.

Top turret to crew, two squadrons of Fw’s turnin’ into us from the north, Plumb Bob announced.

As the bomber stream continued its left turn, it complicated the intercept geometry of the Fw’s, which shifted constantly with the bombers’ changes in heading. Horrified, Plumb watched as Texas Rattler’s turning flight path led it right into an attacking Fw, which chopped off the bomber’s entire empennage just aft of the waist-gun positions. The fighter flew apart like confetti as it exploded into the bomber’s tail, and Texas Rattler tumbled completely out of control. Plumb saw no parachutes and knew another ten young men, if that many survived